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Witness Name: Marylyne Willams
Statement No:WITN05500100
Dated: 20" February 2023
POST OFFICE HORIZON INQUIRY
FIRST WITNESS STATEMENT OF MARYLYNE WILLIAMS
I, Marylyne Williams, will say as follows...
1. I have prepared this statement in response to the request for information
on 24th August 2022 in accordance with Rule 9 of the Inquiry Rules 2006
regarding matters falling within Phases 2 and 3 of the Post Office Horizon IT
Inquiry.
2. I retired from the Post Office in 2002.
3. I started my employment with Post Office Ltd in 1970 as a postal officer.
During my career I progressed to the role of training manager and branch
manager.
4. I applied to become a post office training manager which at the time was a
temporary position. On completion of this role I was successful in being
promoted to a permanent training manager post.
5. During my career I received training to become a postal officer to work on a
branch office counter. I also undertook the training within the post office to
deliver the 6-week counter training course for branch office staff. When the
ECCO system was introduced I was trained internally to operate the system
and deliver training to branch office staff.
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6. I also completed a Certificate in Training and Development.
7. I was trained on the Horizon system by other training managers in
the organisation.
8. I became involved in Horizon when it was introduced in 1999 as a training
manager and my role was to train branch office staff who were already
employed and delivering the service manually. All staff received a one-day
course to enable them to operate the system and those who were responsible
to deliver the cash account had a further 2 days training.
9. Once all the staff were trained on Horizon and it was rolled out, I then
continued to deliver the 6-week training course for newly recruited branch
office staff which included the Horizon system.
10. The 6-week training course included the transaction processes, business
rules and how to input those transactions to the Horizon system. It also
included the individual stock balance procedure using the Horizon system
that they would be required to do weekly at the branch office. The
transactions and stock balances were performed using the Horizon training
system which was not the live system.
11.1 was not directly involved with the training or support of subpostmaster or
franchise staff who were working on Post Office counters.
12.1 did not provide any assistance to the branch office staff once they
completed their 6-week training course.
13. If any trainee was struggling with the Horizon system once they had
completed their training with me I contacted their Branch Manager to make
them aware and agree the support they required when they returned to the
branch.
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14. I was not aware during my employment with the Post Office of any difficulties
or issues with the Horizon system as the classroom used a training system
not the live system and therefore raised no concerns. I was also not aware of
assistance required by subpostmasters.
15. As I was not involved with the subpostmasters I was not in a position to
highlight any improvements that were required to be made to their training.
16. I was not involved with subpostmaster resolution of disputes or shortfalls
within their accounts and did not have any issues relating to this raised to me
during my employment.
17. I had no contact with Fujitsu during my employment with the Post Office.
18. I do not have any other matters to make the inquiry aware of.
Statement of Truth
I believe the content of this statement to be true.
Dated?) Qo Te Bros y 90223